Latest UI attempt still faces big hurdles on Hill

There’s a new unemployment insurance bill in the Senate, but the forecast for renewed aid to jobless Americans is as cloudy as ever.

The bill faces many of the same problems as previous attempts — and some new ones. The nationwide unemployment rate is in steady decline, House Republicans are demanding that any unemployment bill contain “job creation” measures, and Senate Democrats aren’t yet committed to revisiting the issue.

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Meanwhile a pivotal midterm election for control of the Senate is just four months away and Democrats are privately wary of sending any signals that the economic recovery is troubled — like highlighting the 3.4 million long-term unemployed that could be eligible for the new bill from Sens. Dean Heller (R-Nev.) and Jack Reed (D-R.I.).

Though no one is dismissing the dogged bipartisan duo and their six-month quest to restore unemployment benefits for those out of work for more than 26 weeks, the hurdles to actually reviving expired jobless aid are as high as they’ve ever been. Reed and Heller are frustrated that much of the GOP doesn’t see what they see: a proposal that would boost the fortunes of out-of-work Americans and help boost an anemic economy.

Even Heller’s Republican allies on previous unemployment bills are reluctant to get out front on the issue again.

“How many times do we have to go through this exercise without the House showing some interest?” Heller said. “Getting something to the desk of the president to sign it and help these people is what they’re really looking for. They don’t want to go through this exercise over and over again.”

Heller and Reed have put together several unemployment proposals since benefits expired in December, first starting with a yearlong extension that was not paid for, then compromising with centrist Republicans and liberal Democrats on a paid-for five-month extension that passed the Senate in April. But House Speaker John Boehner called the bill “unworkable” for state unemployment agencies and said it lacked job-creation benefits that his members require. That bill’s language expired about a month ago, necessitating a fresh effort.

Senate Democrats, who began working on unemployment in January, appear in no rush to put the new bill up for a vote. All four Senate Democratic leaders said this week that they support revisiting unemployment insurance nearly three months after the Senate first passed a Heller-Reed unemployment collaboration in April. But with essentially two months of legislating days ahead of the election, the timing of a vote is an open question.

Democrats are wary of using up the remaining few weeks of Senate floor time on UI if the House will only ignore it again.

“We need to get some movement in the House. We’ve already passed unemployment extensions over here. And the House, in its typical fashion, has done nothing,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).

On Wednesday afternoon, four Democrats and four Republicans in the House — Jon Runyan of New Jersey, Peter King of New York, Frank LoBiondo of New Jersey and Chris Smith of New Jersey — introduced a companion to the Senate bill. But GOP sources in the House said there’s no chance the chamber moves first.

And even if the Senate did pass another unemployment insurance bill, the House would not consider it without including Republican-supported legislation like approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, repeal of Obamacare’s medical device tax or redefinition of the health care law’s full-time workweek to 40 hours.

Rep. Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania, a Republican who’s openly pushed his leadership to pass an unemployment extension, said that even though Republicans have a new leadership team, it’s up to the Senate to take the lead.